On February 2, 2010, the 82^nd Annual Oscar nominations were released to a crowd of eager and hopeful producers, directors and writers. The small press conference, lead by Oscar nominated actress Anne Hathaway and the President of the Academy Tom Sherak, kick started with smaller categories such as film editing, costume design, and sound mixing, and resumed with few surprises. The nominees for the big categories started, and the actors and directors that many assumed would be nominated were indeed nominated. No big surprises occurred until the nominees for Best Picture were announced. Smaller movies such as “The Blind Side”, “District 9”, and “A Serious Man” were announced as nominees with light gasps from the crowd and large applauses from their producers. Aside from that, the 2010 Academy Award nominations weren’t a very big surprise. Here’s a short list of the main nominations, with the bold selections being my predictions. Watch the Oscars live on March 7. (Predictions are in bold)

BEST PICTURE:                                     

-Avatar

-The Blind Side                                                          

-District 9

-The Education

-The Hurt Locker

-Inglourious Basterds

-Precious: Based of the novel “Push” by Sapphire

-A Serious Man

-Up

-Up in the Air

BEST ACTOR:

-Jeff Bridges, “Crazy Heart”

-George Clooney, “Up in the Air”

-Colin Firth, “A Single Man”

-Morgan Freeman, “Invictus”

-Jeremy Renner, “The Hurt Locker

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR:

-Matt Damon, “Invictus”

-Woody Harrelson, “The Messenger”

-Christopher Plummer, “The Last Station

-Stanley Tucci, “The Lovely Bones”

-Christoph Waltz, “Inglourious Basterds”

BEST ACTRESS:

-Sandra Bullock, “The Blind Side”

-Helen Mirren, “The Last Station

-Carey Mulligan, “An Education”

-Gabourey Sidibe, “Precious: Based on the novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire”

-Meryl Streep, “Julie & Julia

BEST SUPPORTING ACTORESS:

-Penelope Cruz, “Nine”

-Vera Farmiga, “Up in the Air”

-Maggie Gyllenhaal, “Crazy Heart”

-Anna Kendrick, “Up in the Air”

-Mo’Nique, “Precious: Based on the novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire”

 There you have it folks, my fearless, 100% done-and-ready Oscar predictions. I know that by now, if you haven’t already realized, I love Sandra Bullock. After meeting the beautiful first-time Oscar nominee at the Santa Barbara Film Festival, it made me love her that much more. With that aside, I whole-heartedly believe that her performance in “The Blind Side” was the performance of the year, and she deserved to take home the gold. And with 16 Oscar nominations, Meryl Streep is starting to look greedy anyways.